The MBA Student Voice

Snapshots of my life at Anderson

Hello friends!

I am sorry for being MIA for the past weeks, but I am excited to give you a quick walk through of my highlights at Anderson so far. I hope you enjoy the following snapshots!

1. First Case Competition ever

I was lucky to have been chosen to represent UCLA Anderson at the National MBA Human Capital Case Competition sponsored by Deloitte and GE. As I have told you before, my main area of focus within consulting is Human Capital, hence this was an amazing opportunity to get some hands on experience on what it is like to be in an engagement in this practice. For those of you out there who are interested in Human Capital, I have an amazing tip for you: When you are solving a human capital case, do not forget that the business objective drives the solution.

Kudos for my classmates Lindsay Meyer and Tyler Smith for their support and enthusiasm and a big standing ovation to the second years, Jessica Mowry and Richard Wang, who led the team and made this competition an amazing learning experience. 

2. First UCLA Football Game

I have been learning about football for quite some time now and attending this game and actually understanding what was going on was the perfect proof that I am right on track! Unfortunately, the Bruins lost the game against Arizona State. Either way, it was an incredible experience and I cannot wait to attend another game.

3. I am part of the best section of the class of 2017: SECTION D

During orientation the whole class was split into 5 sections and I was blessed with being part of one of the most united, collaborative and creative sections of our class. From producing a Grease spinnoff called Andergrease for our orientation skit to killing it in sports during Game day, people in this section will do great things during the next couple of months! Big thanks to our section leaders, Meredith and Joel, for helping us survive orientation!

 

So far, Anderson is going great! If you have any questions do not hesitate to reach out!

Getting started with Anderson

Hello everybody! In about 20 days I will be travelling 4,176 miles to LA and I am a bit overwhelmed as there is still a lot to do! Besides figuring out living arrangements, making ultimate changes to my budget and scheduling eating every single item on this list, courtesy of Anderson 2017 Camila Moura, I have been focusing on career preparation. As recruiting events and company presentations start as soon as 2 weeks after the quarter begins, Anderson’s Parker Career Management Center (PCMC) has put together a list of summer deliverables on career preparation and tools to complete each one. So far I have been able to work on the first 2 sets of career deliverables and I wanted to share with you a sneak peak of how these two have been helpful to me.

1. Knowing the career path you want to pursue: The first deliverable dealt with understanding how our skills, interests and motivations fit in our future functions or industries. By answering several questions about those three aspects, we were given a report that highlighted possible career paths and how our abilities match to other professionals in those careers. Reflecting on this information has helped me to have my strengths mapped out and to have a better notion of what skills I will need to acquire or improve while at Anderson.

2. Improving your resume content: The second deliverable focuses on improving our resume. PCMC has given us access to videos that address how to optimize each part of our resume by structuring each job bullet in a more result-oriented way. In those videos, I have found great examples from 2^nd year students’ resumes that have helped me highlight specific accomplishments in a more impactful way.

Apart from the PCMC Career deliverables, international students have had the chance to have a one-on-one skype conversation with Qiling He, International Program Manager and Advisor. Through our chat, she wanted to learn more about me, my career path and according to that information, she shared with me career preparation tips, as well as contact information from 2^nd year students who had very similar career aspirations and experience as me.

I feel especially thankful for all the resources we have been given, and it also feels quite great to get started on the MBA experience!

I leave you with a picture of an Anderson meet in Lima Peru!

Diversity @ Anderson

One of the main reasons I chose UCLA Anderson was the diversity of its student body. Anderson’s admissions committee truly does a great job in building a class filled with candidates with different professional backgrounds, life experiences, and interests. This helps to make our MBA journey a lot more enriching as we learn from one another. In this post I wanted to introduce three of my future classmates to give you an inside look into what the Class of 2017 has to offer.

Iacopo Giuliani, Italy

I worked for almost five years at Commerzbank in London. I was a member of the EM Structured Credit Trading team as an EM Repo trader. My job was to price and structure financing deals with various counterparties across the globe. After I resigned, I embarked on an adventurous and extremely rewarding two-month travel that started in LA with A-days and ended up in Peru. I travelled throughout Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Colombia and Peru. The highlight was a 4-day trek that brought to me to the incredible Machu Picchu. Apart from the amazing things I saw, the best and most enriching experiences were meeting fellow travelers and locals and learning about their different values and thoughts.

California, here I come!

March 8^th about 3pm in the afternoon, after reading that there was an admit wave on the “Calling all UCLA Anderson Applicants” thread on Beat the GMAT, I got the call. I was IN!

My name is Lucerna, and I am from Lima, Peru. I will be a full-time MBA student at UCLA Anderson and I am very thrilled to have the opportunity to share my story with all of you and, of course, to connect with you if you have any questions about my experience with the admissions process, relocating to LA from abroad, and about being a student at Anderson.

I graduated from the University of Missouri-St Louis with a degree in Business Administration, and have dedicated myself fully to marketing, brand management and sales ever since.

I am currently leading the marketing and sales department of the family business, a manufacturer and retailer of maternity clothing and baby accessories in Peru.  Managing these two departments made me realize that I was passionate about two aspects of my work: problem solving and human capital management. Therefore, at Anderson I will pursue a switch in careers and focus on Management, Human Capital Consulting, and Human Resources.

Anderson offers a great array of clubs to join. From a career standpoint, I will definitely be involved in the Management Consulting Association and the Strategy and Operations Management Association, and for some fun I am still undecided since there are a lot of options and they all sound great.

Above all, I am excited to meet all of my brilliant and incredibly helpful future classmates. The class of 2017 has been very active in setting up ways to connect with one another and to help each other through all sorts of topics: visa issues, housing, career, and more.  

Outside class, I plan to attend as many sporting events as I can and explore the city and state.

I hope you enjoy reading about my future adventures and please do not hesitate to connect with me via e-mail at [email protected] or you can follow me on twitter.

Lucerna

 

Ready to go back to the US and not have to suffer from extreme weather (Me in St. Louis)

It only took me 3 years to learn about Baseball, so now I am so ready to root for the Dodgers all the way! And hang out with my BFF Yasiel Puig

 and enjoy beautiful sunsets 

---